Where the world’s refugees come from—and where they’re going.
Source: Stop Looking Just at Europe. There’s a Migration Crisis Everywhere. | Mother Jones
Month: September 2015
Source: CloakedTruth
China will be helping out the Syrian government in the fight against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIL/ISIS) by sending “military advisers,” media reports have claimed.
Source: China’s military advisers ‘heading to Syria to help fight ISIS’ – report — RT News
Russian president’s speech covered little new ground but intensified criticism of the US over the rise of the Islamic State and chaos in the Middle East
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Monday called for a united front to fight extremists in the Middle East and said Tehran was ready to help “bring about democrac
Source: Iran’s Rouhani calls for ‘united front’ against extremists – Your Middle East
Russian president Putin and his US counterpart spar over the crisis in Syria in duelling UN speeches.
Because why not?
Source: Michele Bachmann Introduces Lie About Drowned Syrian Boy | Crooks and Liars
As Western countries scramble to seek a deal to end the violence in war-torn Syria, some fear what may happen if embattled leader Bashar al-Assad retains power.
Former Prime Minister Tony Abbott was today reflecting on the occasions he had the opportunity to say Death Cult but didn’t.
“It’s those ‘if only’s’ and ‘what ifs’ that go through your mind,” Mr Abbott told a friend today. “If only I’d found more opportunities to say Daesh Death Cult. What if I’d used 12 flags instead of ten at that last press conference? Sliding doors”.
He said he had considered raising the terror alert level from ‘very high’ to ‘very very high’ in those fateful last few weeks, but became sidetracked with boom mics. “It’s those little things that play on your mind,” he said.
Political analyst Gerard Long said it was natural for leaders to focus on hypotheticals after a fall from power. “For Julia Gillard it was ‘how would’ve things been different without Kevin Rudd?’ For Kevin Rudd it was … actually I’m not sure Kevin is entirely aware he’s no longer PM”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin says he wants “a co-ordinating structure” to fight Islamic State, as world leaders gather at the UN to discuss the issue.
Source: Syria conflict: Russia wants ‘co-ordination’ against IS – BBC News
Report: 30,000 Foreign ISIS Recruits in Syria | Border crackdowns not keeping recruits from getting to caliphate
Source: Report: 30,000 Foreign ISIS Recruits in Syria — News from Antiwar.com
There comes a moment in the political life of every big-personality, more-sizzle-than-steak candidate when they step across the line of legitimacy, even for media addicted to the high ratings these candidate-entertainers provide. That moment for Sarah Palin was her Katie Couric interview in 2008 — the hockey-mom-has-no-clothes revealing from which she, and the McCain campaign, never recovered. In Donald Trump’s candidacy, the equivalent moment might have just happened, at a town hall event in New Hampshire. Cracks are appearing in Trump’s latest Trump-branded edifice — because this one never actually had a foundation. As Palin demonstrated, even the ratings-crazed media are capable of falling out of love with a big-ratings stunt candidate. And when the media fall out of love they fall out of love very quickly.
Source: The Beginning of the End for Trump: His Sarah Palin Moment | Arianna Huffington
Newman, whose term as chairman of PM’s business advisory council has expired, repeatedly questioned climate science in columns for the Australian
Source: Climate sceptic Maurice Newman not reappointed as government adviser | Australia news | The Guardian
It comes as welcome news that Australia is set to abandon its opposition to Bashar al-Assad as part of a durable peace settlement in Syria. The recent military escalation by Russia and reported sightings of Chinese war ships in the Mediterranean in the last week must come as something of an embarrassment to the war…
Source: Julie Bishop’s Epiphany on the Road to Damascus – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Appropriately dubbed the “new Mr Coal” by an excited Andrew Bolt on his weekly Channel Ten slot yesterday, the new Minister for Resources, Energy and Northern Australia, Josh Frydenberg averaged a lie every 3.5 minutes as he raked over the Abbott Government’s legacy on climate change and coal.
Source: Four Lies In 14 Minutes: Josh Frydenberg And His Andrew Bolt Report Porkies | newmatilda.com
The commentators who thought Tony Abbott was their champion are desperately looking for relevance after the coup.
Source: Leadership change sparks civil war at News Corp | The Saturday Paper
The end of the mining boom means fewer migrants coming to Australia in search of work, and interstate migration shifting away from WA
Events have conspired against Malcolm Turnbull in his first week in power in a way that may be irredeemable, writes Bob Ellis.
Sophie Mirabella has won preselection for Indi. Does she deserve a second chance? When Tony Windsor was leaving politics, he said on Insiders that Mrs Mirabella was the person he would miss least in politics, bestowing upon her the “nasty prize”. Sophie said that they’d had little to do with each other other than exchange…
Source: She’s back – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Every government does it, and every opposition rails against it. Appointing political fellow-travellers and ex-colleagues to government boards is common practice in Australia.
Source: Coalition government appoints its political friends and colleagues to boards
Russia, Iran, Iraq and Syria have agreed to establish a joint information center in Baghdad to coordinate their operations against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIL/ISIS) militants, according to sources.
Last week satellite images revealed Russia’s military expansion in Syria, with deployments of troops, tanks and warplanes. Now western governments are scrambling to respond to the shift in power in the Middle East
Source: Vladimir Putin bids for major world role as his forces move into Syria | World news | The Guardian
Since the founding of the United States, generations have been inculcated with the belief that capitalism is the only acceptable method of economic organization. Isn’t it time for a radical change of thinking?
Source: Time to imagine: From ‘Disaster Capitalism’ to a system of our own — RT Op-Edge
VW’s existential crisis has revealed the weaknesses inherent in western economies. Change must now happen
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates support a goal to bring internet access to everyone in the world by 2020.
Feeling the pinch? You’re neither imagining it nor are you alone. Middle Australia is doing it tough.
Doors firmly closed with Tony Abbott as Prime Minister have mysteriously swung open.
Source: Doors open under new PM as Julie Bishop attends UN General Assembly
The new Prime Minister says he’s concerned about what’s happening on Manus Island and Nauru. He should do something about it.
The United Nations has postponed a planned visit to Australia because the federal government has failed to guarantee no one would be charged or intimidated for talking to its special rapporteur about asylum seekers and migrants.
According to some back-of-the-envelope estimates.
Source: Here’s How Much Pollution Volkswagen’s Smog Scandal Produced | Mother Jones
Despite tensions on Iran, Benjamin Netanyahu will collect a check for more military aid to Israel when he visits Washington in November.
Source: Has the Israel lobby really lost its mojo? | The Electronic Intifada
Not content with alienating single women, Latinos and the LGBT community, the two front-runners for the Republican nomination indulged in some naked Islamophobia this past week.
Source: What Trump and Carson Get Wrong: Islam Is as American as Apple Pie | The Nation
More than two weeks have passed since the lifeless body of 3-year-old Aylan Kurdi washed ashore on a Turkish beach, forcing the world to confront the tide of Syrian asylum seekers massing at Europe’s borders.
Source: Long Before the Refugee Crisis, the World’s Powers Had Failed the People of Syria | The Nation
New short documentary includes testimony from eyewitness to attack that killed baby sleeping in his home.
Source: Why Israelis can burn Palestinians alive and get away with it | The Electronic Intifada
Weapons sales from Israel to Africa rose by 40 percent in 2014.
Source: Israeli arms fuel atrocities in Africa | The Electronic Intifada
But Björk Vilhelmsdóttir sees a silver lining in controversy over shortlived Israel boycott by Iceland’s capital.
Money raised from halal certification passes through a network of intricate pathways in South Australian Senator Cory Bernardi’s brain, before re-appearing weeks later as a fully-formed conspiracy theory.
That’s the finding of a Senate enquiry, established at the urging of Mr Bernardi, to analyse the link between the two activities.
Experts presenting evidence at the enquiry said they spent weeks tracing the flow of information through Mr Bernardi’s brain.
“We found that it starts its journey in what on the surface is a relatively rational part of the Senator’s mind. But it then travels through what we call the Paranois Vortex, a secretive, shadowy section of the brain, before finally resurfacing via Mr Bernardi’s mouth as a crazy terrorist plot. It’s a very complex process. I’m not even sure Mr Bernardi understands what’s going on,” the lead researcher said.
Mr Bernardi was unavailable for comment.
MINA – (CT&P) – CNN is reporting that over 700 religious kooks were trampled to death and over 900 were injured yesterday in a stampede during the annual “stoning the Devil” ritual in the tent city of Mina, about two miles from Mecca.
Footage obtained by CNN Arabic shows a disturbing scene. Bodies piled upon bodies, a few moving, but most appearing lifeless. Workers in hard hats and reflective vests can be seen pulling dead bodies away to get to those who are still alive.
CNN Middle East correspondent John Small Berries told Wolf Blitzer this morning that the stampede was caused by cretinous religious pilgrims at the back of the line becoming impatient with the cretinous religious pilgrims at the front of the line.
“Apparently the idiots at the back thought that the idiots at the front were using up all the good rocks Wolf,” said Small Berries. “They just lost it and started crushing the folks up front in an effort to claim some choice rocks for themselves.”
The ridiculous ritual features crazy ass folks throwing pebbles at walls which is meant to simulate Abraham rejecting the temptation to spare his son Ishmael after the all-loving deity Jehovah instructed Abraham to murder him because the Good Lord was in a bad fucking mood that day.
The murder, which was called off at the last second, is for some weird reason considered something to celebrate by all three Abrahamic religions.
This is not the first time the “stoning of the Devil” concert has led to tragedy.
July 2, 1990 : A stampede inside a pedestrian tunnel (Al-Ma’aisim tunnel) leading out from Mecca towards Mina and the Plains of Arafat led to the deaths of 1,426 pilgrims, many of them of Malaysian, Indonesian and Pakistani origin.
May 23, 1994 : A stampede killed at least 270 pilgrims at the stoning of the Devil ritual.
April 9, 1998: at least 118 pilgrims were trampled to death and 180 injured in an incident on Jamarat Bridge.
March 5, 2001: 35 pilgrims were trampled to death in a stampede during the stoning of the Devil ritual.
February 11, 2003: The stoning of the Devil ritual claimed 14 pilgrims’ lives.
February 1, 2004: 251 pilgrims were killed and another 244 injured in a stampede during the stoning ritual in Mina.
January 12, 2006: A stampede during the stoning of the Devil on the last day of the Hajj in Mina killed at least 346 pilgrims and injured at least 289 more. The incident occurred shortly after 13:00 local time, when a busload of travellers arrived together at the eastern access ramps to the Jamarat Bridge. This caused pilgrims to trip, rapidly resulting in a lethal stampede. An estimated two million people were performing the ritual at the time.
Safety precautions put in place by the Saudi government have so far been unable to stop the carnage year after year.
“Wolf, no matter what the Saudis do this kind of stuff is just going to happen,” remarked Small Berries. “These people just love to throw rocks. They’ll throw rocks at just about anything from an Israeli tank to an adulterous woman to a passing automobile. I have no idea what causes it, but there must be something in their genetic makeup that makes these cretins fire machine guns in the air and throw rocks at things, even inanimate objects.”
Although an investigation into the completely senseless deaths has been ordered by Saudi King Salman, no one expects anything to be done to prevent future bloodbaths.
You just can’t teach an old religion new tricks.
US presidential candidates react to Pope Francis’s historic address to the US Congress with cheers and tears.
Now that Tony Abbott’s time as prime minister and leader of the Liberal Party is over, how does his record of claims and promises stack up?
One in five privately-owned companies with revenues in excess of $100 million paid no tax last year, the Australian Tax Office has revealed.
Source: One in five large private companies paid no tax last year: ATO
The ABC is hopeful the instillation of Malcolm Turnbull as Prime Minister will allow it to claw back some of the $250 million slashed from the broadcaster last year as tension between the government and broadcaster cools off.
Source: ABC hopes for funding boost as Malcolm Turnbull ends ‘culture wars’
Tony Abbott’s chief of staff Peta Credlin was the victim of a sexist attack for being a strong woman, Opposition Leader Bill Shorten has said as he fired a shot at “gutless” Coalition MPs who have blamed Ms Credlin for the government’s woes.
Source: Peta Credlin’s treatment by government MPs was sexist: Bill Shorten
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